


a leanbh

by artoriusrex (jesusonaunicycle)



Series: bean-sidhe [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Fae & Fairies, Fairy Tale Elements, Family Dynamics, Family Secrets, Gen, Irish Sarah Rogers, Irish Steve Rogers, Irish Winifred Barnes, Magical Realism, Mother-Son Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-24
Updated: 2017-02-24
Packaged: 2018-09-22 02:40:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9578852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesusonaunicycle/pseuds/artoriusrex
Summary: James Buchanan didn’t remember the words his mother uttered that day, but he remembered the sentiment. Missus Rogers was fae, old and haunting like the songs his mother sang. A ghost woman.James Buchanan and his mother meet Sarah Rogers.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, I'm back! With less crack and more fairytale-esque writing. I love the idea of Sarah Rogers telling the boys old stories, and then I started researching, and I guess my imagination got away with me!
> 
> Let me know if you guys see any mistakes or have any critiques!
> 
>  **Warnings:** _mild blood and gore, frank talk of childbirth, is this imprinting i have no idea but bucky is only four years older than steve here, and fairytale elements._

There were tales of changelings, and fae, and brownies, and of goblins and elves, but James Buchanan loved the stories of banshees the most. Banshees, or _bean-sidhe,_ were fae-women who screamed in the dead of night to warn families of impending death. The only course of action was to watch and wait for it; James Buchanan knew this from his mother, a dark-haired, dark-eyed Irish woman who had borne two children before James and two children after. She would sing to them by lamplight, stroking the silkiness of her children’s hair each, and told them stories of her home. For James’ two brothers, Charles and Arthur, the stories were to put them to sleep; their big brown eyes fluttered shut the second their mother started to sing. But for James and his two sisters, the stories were riveting. Fantastical beasts, seafaring tragedy, the sickness of longing and the ache of love, all twisted up in their mother’s low, soft voice. Even Nonie, the eldest Barnes child, sat and listened raptly to her mother, her eyes as big and dark as the sea.

Needless to say, James Buchanan grew up hearing about the tales of the homeland, and knew what to look for in every person, every infant, every grandmother. He was always a perceptive child; more like his mother in the way he walked and talked, though he was the spitting image of his Lithuanian father. 

His mother was always helping the pregnant ladies in the neighborhood. Home remedies, she called them, but James Buchanan knew better; his mother was of the Old Way, and her own mama had taught her about midwifing. She often brought James along with her, to charm the mother-to-be and ease the way of her work.

So, when Missus Sarah Rogers gave birth to a squalling baby boy in the middle of a summer rainstorm, James Buchanan had a front-row seat.

Missus Rogers was a tough but gentle woman with an air about her that screamed. Sarah Rogers could part a crowd just by taking a step forward. She got off the boat after James’ mama, but had found herself an American husband, which was very controversial in the borough. Missus Rogers had long, thick blonde hair, a gentle smattering of cinnamon freckles across the bridge of her nose, and eyes as cold and sharp as ice.

James remembered the first time his mama saw Missus Rogers. James was barely four years old, but he’d never, not once in his life, seen Winifred Barnes go so still. His mother had a healthy flush on her most days, helped along with rouge, but the moment Sarah Rogers looked in her direction, she went white as a sheet.

James Buchanan didn’t remember the words his mother uttered that day, but he remembered the sentiment. Missus Rogers was _fae_ , old and haunting like the songs his mother sang. A ghost woman.

The Irish were all cornered into one section of New York; it was impossible not to know each other a little, at least by sight. But the majority of them steered well clear of Missus Rogers. Except, of course, James’ mama, who wouldn’t turn down a challenge, and had made it her self-imposed mission to ease the birth of every Irish baby on American soil.

Missus Rogers was cold to them, that first day. Her new husband had gone away—a broad mountain of a man with kind brown eyes named Mister Joseph Rogers—to war, she’d said, eyes flashing and hackles raised. He remembered hiding behind his mother’s skirt, peering up at the woman who seemed to loom over him and his mother, despite being barely five feet tall and waifish.

“Haven’t any use for your services, Miss Barnes,” Sarah Rogers had said when James’ mama had offered her services. Even five months pregnant and destitute, Missus Rogers had an air of dignity that set her chin higher than any of her neighbors’. “I’ve heard Saoirse down the road is expectin’, if you’re lookin’ for work.”

James Buchanan had tugged urgently on his mama’s skirt, knowing a dismissal when he heard one. Winifred Barnes had just smiled, her demeanor soft and stubborn even in the face of Missus Rogers’ icy glare. “Don’t have nothin’ to do with work, Miss Sarah,” she said, placing a comforting hand James’ head. “I do what I can for the neighborhood. I don’t expect nothin’.”

A contemplative hum had been heard from Missus Rogers. Interested, James had poked his head out to see the fabled banshee woman, only to be met by a visage that remained in his memory forever, even throughout years of torture and age.

The banshee had looked at him with her narrow, fae eyes, blue and shallow like iced-over ponds, red-rimmed. Her face was shining with sweat from the New York spring. But her face was not twisted in a snarl, like he’d expected, nor was she glaring hatefully at him like the neighbors whispered. No, Missus Rogers saw him, looked him dead in the eye, and had smiled, soft and slow, like honey. Her teeth were not jagged and pointed, either.

Winifred Barnes had clutched her son by his shoulders, and gently introduced him. “This is my youngest lad, James,” she’d said, ruffling his dark hair. “What do we say, Jamie?”

“H-Hello, ma’am,” James Buchanan had recited, though the reverence of which he said “ma’am” could properly be translated to “my lady.” Miss Rogers’ smile had widened at that.

“What a well-mannered child,” Sarah Rogers had cooed, the highest compliment given from one mother to another at the time, and Winifred Barnes had preened. “And handsome, too.”

James Buchanan had puffed up slightly, at that. His mother said the same every night when he went to sleep. To hear the banshee woman call him handsome was the highest honor he’d ever been given.

“Thank you,” he’d said, pronouncing the words carefully. Again, Sarah Rogers had smiled at him with delight.

“I’d see to have your services a few days a week, if you don’t mind, Miss Barnes,” Sarah Rogers had pronounced with the air of a reigning queen at court. Winifred’s hands tightened in his hair.

“I do have other women in my charge, Miss Sarah,” she’d protested, but Missus Rogers had waved the statement away.

“I’ll compensate you, surely. And I wouldn’t dream of takin’ you too long away from the others. I am not wholly selfish.” There was a challenge in the banshee’s eyes, but they softened when she looked at James.

Winifred was obviously shaken, but she did not let that sully her good manners. She’d smiled and said she’d meet with Missus Rogers again in the next week. But, just after they’d said their goodbyes and had started to walk away, Missus Rogers had called out to them.

“Oh, Miss Barnes?” she’d called, standing on a street corner in a raggedy white dress, chin tilted high and eyes flashing, “Do bring your Jamie with you. I’d love to see him again.”

Later in life, James Buchanan recognizes this encounter as the moment the Rogers family had chosen him. For better or for worse, James Buchanan Barnes had belonged to a Rogers long before he’d known what that meant.

Winifred’s hands had shook. “Of course, Miss Sarah. I wouldn’t dream of not bringin’ my son.” Missus Rogers had smiled, triumphant, before turning and disappearing behind the corner. As for the Barneses, Winifred rushed James home, and wouldn’t allow him to play outside with his siblings for two days.

After that, both James and Winifred spent two days a week at Sarah Rogers’ apartment, a cramped little shoebox that was practically a palace to James, who lived in a tenement in the rougher side of town.

Missus Rogers was exceptionally kind to them. She gave them food (mostly boiled leftovers, but James Buchanan wasn’t very picky and food was hard enough to come by), and a strange herbal tea that she served every visit. His mama looked at it distrustfully at first, but eventually got used to drinking it, as to not insult Missus Rogers.

James Buchanan was instructed to _never_ insult Missus Rogers. His mama had sat him down, dark eyes wide and grave.

“You mustn’t be rude to Missus Rogers, Jamie. You know what happens, don’t you?”

“Yes, Mama,” James had said, just as gravely. “Ya can’t be mean ta’ the banshee, or else ya mama will cry.”

“Good lad,” Winifred had said, eyes sad. “You must be very careful with Missus Rogers, _a stór._ She may be fond of you, but you _must_ be cautious.”

James Buchanan, who had simply wanted to go back to playing with his younger sister, nodded seriously. Winifred had taken that nod as confirmation, but she should have known better. Never was there a time that young James Buchanan had stopped asking questions.

In retrospect, maybe he should have listened to his mother more attentively.

 

 

On the eve of Sarah Rogers’ childbirth, both Winifred and James were in attendance at the Rogers apartment. Sarah had made several meals (all boiled, but nonetheless a bounty where a hungry four-year-old was concerned), and had them sit together in a parody of the meals James had at home. Winifred had sat down warily, but James had plopped down eagerly and beamed.

Missus Rogers smiled at him beatifically. Pregnancy suited her; her normally pallid skin had a healthy glow, and the red-rimmed look of her eyes had lessened in the later trimester. But her eyes were still a piercing blue, and she sat with the refinery of a queen—even nine months pregnant and in the heat of summer.

“You’re lucky, Winifred,” Sarah Rogers told James’ mama that night, after dinner. Her teary eyes reflected the lamplight, pinpricks like will-o’-wisps dancing in her gaze. Winifred looked startled for a moment, clutching her tin mug of tea close to her chest. Her son was playing with a small wooden horse, one given to him by Missus Rogers that past Easter, by the fire escape.

“What do you mean, Miss Sarah?” she asked. Though they’d become friendlier in four months, Winifred was still wary of Sarah, and Sarah still talked to Winifred with a cool detachment. But this night, Sarah Rogers was watching Winifred Barnes with a sad envy, not malicious or hostile in nature, but sort of resigned—the most emotion Winifred had ever seen from her.

Sarah Rogers sighed, a wistful and sorrowful thing. She stared down at her cup of herbal tea and said softly, “My husband will not return from this war, Winifred. My child will be without a father.”

Winifred sucked in a harsh breath. The men were just beginning to come home.

She’d heard the news—there were whispers all over their part of Brooklyn, tales of hearing the banshee crying in the night, wailing sobs for three days. Women and children huddled in their homes, trying to block out the screams.

“I’m so sorry to hear of your loss, Miss Sarah,” she said, empathy welling up inside her. She too knew of loss, and it was terrible to hear that Sarah Rogers would be without family, especially after leaving Ireland behind.

“Please, just call me Sarah.” Missus Rogers’—Sarah’s—smile was watery at best. But her chin was still held high, and she continued on in a strong voice, “My child will be without a father, but he will not be without a mother. And, I hope, good friends,” she said, looking at Winifred expectantly.

At first, Winifred was confused. Sarah hadn’t really considered them friends—or, at least, that’s not how it appeared. But she was not foolish enough to not notice the interest the banshee had in her son. Sarah may have no real use for Winifred, but she may have something in mind for Jamie. With a sinking stomach, Winifred felt protectiveness replace the empathy in her chest.

“You can’t take my son,” she found herself snarling, her knuckles going white around the tin mug.

Sarah Rogers, for her part, did not look shocked at all. In fact, she was supremely unruffled, only her teary, icy eyes an indicator of her emotions. “I have no interest in takin’ your son,” she whispered, “for I have one of my own. Or I will, by tomorrow.” She paused after this, idly swirling her tea. She stared at the brown liquid before going on. “I am… askin’ for your consideration, Winifred. Consideration of allowin’ my son and yours to be… friends.”

_“Anamchara_.” The word burst from her mouth before she could rein them in.“That’s what you’re askin’, isn’t it?” Winifred stared at Sarah in dawning realization as she smiled patiently.

“Yes. That’s what I’m askin’.”

“How?” The question was low and breathy, as if it’d been punched out of her.

“I knew the moment I saw your lad,” Sarah Rogers said, a delicate hand touching the top of her pregnant belly. Her voice was soft but swift. “I looked into his eyes and felt him look back. My son made his choice.”

A wounded noise broke from Winifred’s throat. James Buchanan sat near the fire escape, making horse noises with his mouth, playing with the toy Sarah Rogers had given him. He didn’t hear his mother start to cry.

Sarah Rogers stared at Winifred Barnes with something akin to pity in her bloodshot eyes.

That night, a horrific rainstorm tore through Brooklyn, making shutters rattle and buildings quake with thunder. And throughout this caterwauling was the banshee, screaming in earnest as she gave birth to her son at home, with only Winifred Barnes and a terrified James Buchanan trembling in her wake.

After the birth, the rain almost immediately cleared. A waning crescent moon shone little light on the soaked, cracked streets. And Sarah Rogers, babe in arms, wept softly for the first time in front of another person.

James, though subjected to his mother’s painful grip on his arm, strode forward to see the little baby. Winifred was a step behind, whispering heatedly to her own son about the dangers of coming too close to a new mother, that the baby may look unnatural but they all looked the same, and other cautionary tales that the boy only listened to with half an ear. He was too busy staring at the baby.

He had wispy blond hair already, matted and wet with blood atop his tiny head. His skin was bright pink, as well as his lips, which were open in a high-pitched wail. His chubby hands were smacking at anything that moved, including his own mother, who watched with unabashed affection and love. Still, to James Buchanan’s surprise, she was crying.

“Miss Sarah,” James said, slurring his s’s slightly due to his missing two front teeth, “why’re you cryin’? He seems to be alright, ain’t he?”

At the sound of his voice, Sarah’s son stopped crying. The babe turned in his mother’s arms to stare at James. Winifred’s breath caught in her throat at the cerulean blue of the baby’s eyes.

Ice blue, like his mother’s, red and teary, with a scream that could wake the dead.

“He’s beautiful,” James Buchanan proclaimed, fixated on the child. He bent over the bed to get a closer look and was subjugated to the baby’s whining and fervent fists. Winifred’s Jamie was smiling ear to ear, flushed and pleased, and she found herself staring in wonder.

Sarah Rogers watched her, tears still tacked to her cheeks. A wry smile had graced her mouth, and for once, Winifred saw true joy on the banshee’s face. 

The babe fussed after a while, though he’d been so intent on Jamie that he hadn’t noticed his own mother, nor had he stopped to feed. He turned to his mother, whimpering, and Sarah Rogers hushed him.

“Shush, _an leanbh_ , hush,” she was smiling while she said it, though, waxy-faced and still in pain from the birth. Winifred quietly started to clean up the bloody afterbirth on the bed while Jamie was softly chattering to both Sarah and the babe.

“He’s so pretty, Miss Sarah—you have the handsomest baby I ever seen, what’re you gonna name ‘im Miss Sarah?” Jamie said, rapid-fire. Sarah laughed hoarsely.

“I don’t rightly know, Jamie. I’m thinking something to… something to remember his father,” she said, her voice a whisper. Winifred looked up in surprise, but all she saw was consideration in the mother’s eyes.

Jamie wrinkled his nose. “He doesn’t look like a Joseph.”

“No?” Sarah asked, carefully shifting her baby in her arms so she could properly look at him.

“James Buchanan Barnes,” Winifred _tch_ ed sharply at her son, who only pouted.

“He _doesn’t,_ Ma,” Jamie said petulantly, to which Sarah asked him, “What would you name him then, Jamie?”

Her son stared at Sarah Rogers for a long moment, then looked back at the baby. Immediately, the little boy craned his strengthless neck to try and look back.

“Steve,” James proclaimed suddenly. “Or Charlie, like Charlie Chaplin.”

Despite herself, Winifred barked out a laugh. She was hands-deep in fluid and flesh, and her boy was talking about an _actor._ She opened her mouth to apologize, but then she saw Sarah grinning, true happiness lighting up her eyes.

“I was thinkin’ that too, Jamie. Little Steven,” she said, tucking her chin to look at her baby as he suckled at her breast. “Steven Grant, how about that?”

Jamie had puffed up several sizes, the way he always did when he impressed Sarah Rogers. Winifred was awed, but she knew that weary look in a mother’s eyes, and knew the dangers of exhausting a newborn, so she quickly finished up her work and set to get Jamie out of the room. Jamie, of course, didn’t want to leave his new favorite person. But he relented, only with the knowledge that he and his mama would be spending the night in the Rogers household, to make sure that the night is safe for both mother and child.

As Winifred was finishing up her touches for the night, bathing the bed clean of stray blood not caught by her towels and sheets, Sarah Rogers said her name, very quietly, for Steven was already asleep.

“Winifred,” she said, to which Winifred looked up, and startled upon seeing tears in Sarah’s eyes.

“Sarah, what’s wrong?” she asked urgently, rushing up to her. But Sarah kept shaking her head, tears running freely down her cheeks.

“He—He named him, Winifred. He named him,” Sarah kept repeating, delirious from exhaustion.

Winifred started to shush her, calm her, as to not wake the baby. “You must calm down, Sarah. You need to rest, you’re exhausted,” she murmured. Sarah kept crying, but eventually her breathing evened. She watched Winifred’s face as her eyes began to close.

“He _named him,_ Winifred. I was right.” She smiled, a sharp, triumphant thing, so incongruous to her soft voice and sleepy eyes. A predator’s smile. “I was right,” she whispered, finally, before she drifted into sleep.

It took almost an hour for Winifred to move. So shocked was she, that she didn’t sleep—she curled up on the spare mattress that Sarah had somehow found for them, her sleeping, dear baby boy pressed up against her chest, and cried silently until morning.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments are love!!
> 
> The Irish used:  
>  **a stór** \- my treasure  
>  **a leanbh** \- my child  
>  **anamchara** \- soul friend
> 
> Also, I made Bucky's dad Lithuanian in this because I just finished _The Jungle_ and I have intense feelings about Eastern European immigrants coming to the United States. HOW Winifred Barnes married a Lithuanian immigrant is... up to you guys to decide.
> 
> If you guys want to see more of this, just leave me a comment or message me on tumblr here: [x](http://capnsteeb.tumblr.com/) and hopefully I won't lapse into another bout of depression-induced writer's block!!


End file.
